The Death of Charles Walton

Charles Walton was found murdered on February 14th, 1945 in Warwickshire, England. The foremost police detective of the era, Chief Inspector Robert Fabian, led the investigation into Walton's death. The chief suspect for the murder was Alfred John Potter. However, there was insufficient evidence to convict Potter and the case is currently the oldest unsolved murder in the Warwickshire Constabulary records. The case has also earned notoriety due to its supposed connection with the local belief in witchcraft.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
This podcast contains adult content.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
Some of the themes or topics may include information on murder, kidnapping, torture, dismemberment,
maybe some demonic content.

Speaker 3 (00:17):
With information on positions and paranormal activity.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
This podcast will also include explicit, horrible, and.

Speaker 1 (00:26):
Foul, socially unacceptable, totally uninhibited.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
Adult themes language.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
So if you're easily offended, if you're easily triggered, then
I highly suggest you turn this off now on.

Speaker 3 (00:42):
If not, just keep.

Speaker 2 (00:45):
In mind parental discretion is advised. Welcome to this episode
of Mysterious Circumstances podcast.

Speaker 1 (00:53):
I'm your host, Justin.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
Welcome to twenty twenty four, where I'm going to be
getting on a regular schedule againy fucking ha. Today we're
gonna be talking about the nineteen forty five murder of
Charles Walton, also known as the Witchcraft Murder.

Speaker 1 (01:10):
But before we.

Speaker 2 (01:11):
Do that, I do have a bunch of Patreon subscribers
to think, So start off with mothmand Farms, rihann and McCord,
Dustin Anderson Davis, Carolyn Coleman, Katie patrese Villary, Karen Sassey.
It's either sass or sassy. I am super fucking sorry

(01:33):
if I mispronounced that last name. We got Catherine Mindenhall
Matthew and that is about it. I hope you guys
are enjoying that extra content that I got on the
Patreon feed. I think we're up to about one hundred
and fifty episodes, one hundred and forty episodes.

Speaker 1 (01:50):
Something like that.

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If anybody else is interested in subscribing, you can go
to patreon dot com slash Mysterious Circumstances, scroll through see
if there's some things you like. It's only two dollars
a month. You get access to everything. It's probably one
of the cheaper Patreon subscriptions out there for sure.

Speaker 1 (02:08):
Just uploaded I think.

Speaker 2 (02:09):
Like two episodes the other day and they're just each
episode is two small paranormal cases and then two small
unsolved deaths.

Speaker 1 (02:19):
But yeah, got a live show.

Speaker 2 (02:21):
Coming up May eighteenth, twenty twenty four with Brohio Podcast.
That'll be at the Boone County Jail Distillery in Lebanon, Indiana.
It's just west of Indy, maybe like an hour west
of Indy, but yeah, it is legitimately an old jail
that they turned into a distillery. It's gonna be bad ass,
gonna be a long show. Tickets are on sale now.

(02:44):
I think there's only twenty five left. We're only selling fifty.
They're going pretty fast. So if you want to jump
on that, you can go down to the episode description
or the podcast description and I'll have a link right
there and you can just hit it. If not, you
can just Google and it'll come up in your search bar.
With all that behind us, let's go ahead and get

(03:04):
on with the show.

Speaker 3 (03:06):
In ninety forty five, on the slopes of men Hill,
an event took place which brought witchcraft into the national dailies.
A particularly gruesome murder was committed, which soon became known
as the Witchcraft murder.

Speaker 2 (03:37):
All right, this murder happened on February fourteenth, Valentine's Day,
nineteen forty five. Let's talk a little bit about Charles Walton.

Speaker 1 (03:46):
He was seventy four years.

Speaker 2 (03:47):
Old at the time of his death. He was born
in May of eighteen seventy. Despite needing a stick to
walk because he had arthritis, he was still fit and
a very active guy. He was widowed in nineteen twenty
seven and he lived with his adult niece by the
name of Edith, who was thirty three at the time.

(04:07):
He and his wife had adopted Edith when she was
three when her mother died, which was Charles's sister. They
lived in a small cottage in the village of Lower
Quinton in Warwickshire. Walton lived in this cottage since World
War One and he had lived in the village his
entire life. Walton had given Edith one pound per week

(04:29):
for housekeeping, and he also paid the three shillings per
week rent on the cottage, as well as buying their
coal and their meat. And I'll break down the pounds
and shillings how all that works here a little bit
later in the episode, because money is a factor in
this death.

Speaker 1 (04:45):
So in addition to his.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
Casual earnings, which was from random farm hand work, Walton
received ten shillings a week for old age pension. Edith
worked as a print assistant at the Royal Society of Arts,
which had relocated to the village during.

Speaker 1 (05:04):
World War Two.

Speaker 2 (05:06):
It said that Charles Walton was a popular and well
liked member of the community, although some people thought he
was a little eccentric and some people were also suspicious
of him, but he was also respected even by the
people who you know, kind of were suspicious of him,
and it was well known in the village that there

(05:27):
was something peculiar about Charles Walton. He was described as
something of a loner who had earned a reputation as
a trainer of horses.

Speaker 1 (05:37):
In his youth.

Speaker 2 (05:39):
It is said that he did not socialize with his
neighbors very much, but that he was not disliked. And
on the day of his death, on February fourteenth, he
had got up early that morning, which was routine.

Speaker 1 (05:51):
He would get up early every day. The young guys were.

Speaker 2 (05:54):
Still at war and there was lots of shit to
do around the village, so you know, he was fit.
He was active, he was helping out. He had worked
on local farms since he had left school, and for
the past nine months Charles had been working at the
furs farm for a guy named Alfred Potter. So let's
jump on into this timeline here. On February fourteenth, nineteen forty.

Speaker 1 (06:19):
Five, at nine am, he leaves his cottage.

Speaker 2 (06:22):
He heads through the local churchyard to cut some hedges
at the hill ground on the slopes of Meon Hill.
Walton left his wallet at home. He took his pitchfork,
a bill hook, and a piece of fruitcake for his
lunch Bey honest man's dude's living his best life right now.
Eating fruitcake for lunch man sounds really good. So shortly

(06:45):
after Walton left for Meon Hill, Edith went to work
in the local factory that she worked at. Between nine
am and nine thirty am, he was witnessed walking.

Speaker 1 (06:55):
Through the churchyard.

Speaker 2 (06:57):
At six pm, Edith Walton arrived home from work and
she was surprised that her uncle wasn't home yet. Walton
was expected to be home by about four pm, and
she knew that he wouldn't be in like a local
bar or a local pub or visiting a friend. He
was described as a very solitary man. He had his routine,

(07:17):
he had his habits, and he always returned home at
the same time, especially during the winter months when the
dark evenings would make it hard to work outside. So
she was worried that he might have gotten sick, might
have had an accident, something like that. So she goes
and runs next door to her neighbor, guy named Harry Beasley,

(07:39):
and that both of them they start walking to Mean
Hill and the first farm. Now on their way, they
stopped to get the farmer, Alfred Potter like I said.
Alfred Potter was the owner of the first farm in
Walton's employer that day, and he had not seen him either,
but he said he had noticed a distant figure that

(07:59):
morning on the hillside whom he had assumed to be
Walton because he seemed to be cutting hedges. So now
the Potter knows what's going on. He's worried too, so
he joins Harry Beasley and Edith and they start walking
towards the hill. They're all carrying torches and shit because
it's pretty much darkness outside, and they walked up to

(08:22):
the hill to the point where Walton had last been seen,
and after a short search of the area, the group
came across Charles Walton's body and without hesitation, Edith began
screaming she just totally lost her shit. So Beasley tries
to console her and make sure that she didn't like

(08:45):
walk too close to the scene. And at that moment,
another guy named Harry Peachey was walking along the other
side of the hedge, so Alfred Potter calls out to
him and he's like pointing at the body. He's like, hey,
you know you need to go get the cops. Dude,
so by about seven pm the police had been informed

(09:05):
of Walton's murder and Potter stood guard over the murder
scene until the police arrived, and this is while Beasley
had taken Edith back down the hill. At seven o
five pm, the first policeman on the scene arrived and
it was Police Constable Michael James Lomasney. Members of Stratford

(09:27):
Avon CID arrived a little later in the evening, while
Professor James M. Webster of the West Midlands Forensic Lab
arrived at about eleven thirty pm and the body was
removed at one thirty am the following morning. Let's talk
about why Edith completely lost her mind when she saw

(09:49):
the crime scene. When they found Charles, he was laying
there dead next to the hedge that he had been trimming.
The ground around him was covered in blood. Charles had
been beaten with his own walking stick. The walking stick
was found three and a half yards from his body,
with blood and hair still stuck to it. A big

(10:10):
cross was carved into his chest. His neck had been
slashed with a bill hook and it was slashed so
deep it almost decapitated him, and it was still stuck
in his neck at the time. The pitchfork was used
to pin him to the ground, also in the neck area,
and it was pinned so deep that it took two men.

Speaker 1 (10:31):
To pull it out.

Speaker 2 (10:33):
So Professor Webster concluded that Walton's wounds had been caused
by two weapons, a stabbing weapon and a cutting weapon,
presumably the pitchfork and the slash hook. And the only
thing missing from Charles Walton was his old tin pocket watch,
which wasn't even worth any money really, it was a
junk old tin pocket watch. So the first medical observations

(10:58):
were made by doctor A. R. Mcwinnie who had a
private practice in Strafford, and the post mortem was done
by Professor Webster from the West Midlands Forensic Laboratory. Here's
doctor mcwhinnie's notes when he documented the murder and this
is all quoted. The body was lying on its left

(11:19):
side with the knees and hips in a bent position.
There was a gash on the right side of the
neck involving the main structures of the neck and the
cut ends of main vessels, and the lacerated windpipe could
be seen. The tip of a bill hook was buried
at least four inches in the tissue at the front

(11:40):
of the neck. In addition, the face was impaled by
a pitchfork, one prong entered on either side of the face,
just below and in front of the angle of the jaw.
The handle of the fork had been pressed backwards and
the end of the handle was wedged under the cross
member of the head behind the head, thus anchoring the

(12:03):
head to the ground. The autopsy report later revealed that
the murderer had also beaten Charles over the head with
his own stick, and that he had numerous other injuries,
including multiple bruises, a severed clavicle, and broken ribs, and
his trachea had been cut. Walton's shirt had been opened,

(12:24):
his trousers had been unfastened at the top, and his
fly was unbuttoned. Now, despite persistent reports that a cross
had been carved into Charles's chest, which would suggest a
ritualistic murder, the detailed report makes no such claim. There's
no observation in there at all. Walton also had defensive wounds.

(12:49):
He had a cut on his left hand and bruises
on the back of his right hand and forearm, which
means he had absolutely fought for his life. It was
he determined that Walton died between one and two pm
on February fourteenth. Now let's talk about the investigation. Local

(13:10):
police called in Scotland Yard, which was known as the
Metropolitan Police. They called in for help. This was common
in the nineteen forties. Some reports say it was because
of the nature of the crime. I could see it
going both ways, to be honest with you. So on
February fifteen, the Deputy Chief Constable of Warwickshire sent a

(13:32):
message which stated the Chief Constable has asked me to
get the assistance of Scotland Yard to assist in a
brutal case of murder that took place yesterday. The deceased
is a man named Charles Walton, aged seventy five, and
he was killed with an instrument known.

Speaker 1 (13:49):
As a slash hook. The murder was either.

Speaker 2 (13:51):
Committed by a madman or one of the Italian prisoners
who are in a camp nearby. The assistance of an
Italian interpreter would be necessary, I think. Doctor Webster states
the deceased was killed between one and two pm yesterday.
A metal watch is missing from the body. It is
being circulated. So by the following day one of England's

(14:16):
best detectives took over the case and his name was
Robert Fabian. Along with his assistant, Sergeant Albert Webb, they
met with Detective Inspector Alec Spooner, who was a local
Warwickshire policeman. They start to hunt for the killer and
they do a very methodical and detailed investigation into the murder.

(14:38):
The investigation was actually the final case for Fabian, who
was going to be retiring soon. Fabian was an aging
celebrity detective though, and he had a lot of media
hype behind him, saying that he was the living version
of Sherlock Holmes, and because of him, Lower Quinton gained

(15:00):
a whole new level of media attention. Newspapers loved turning
the story of Charles Walton's death into a murder mystery
about old fashioned, rural people who worshiped a sun god.
The local paper, called the Coventry Telegraph, referred to this
case as a who done it witchcraft murder. The next

(15:22):
step was a ground search which was carried out by
local officers with help from soldiers of the Royal Engineers
with metal detectors. They were looking for Walton's pocket watch
and it had been discovered that it was the only
thing missing, which Walton had always carried in his waistcoat.
So Fabian thought it was really odd because the watch

(15:43):
was a super cheap one. It was mad to ten,
but he hoped that if they found it it would
have fingerprints of the killer. They did an intensive search
of the area and the watch was not found.

Speaker 1 (15:55):
The details of.

Speaker 2 (15:56):
The watch were passed to pawnbrokers and jewelers. They described
it as gents plain white metal pocket watch, snapcase at back,
white enamel face with Edgar Jones Stratford on Avon engraved
into it. It was second hand English numerals, valued at

(16:17):
twenty five shillings about ten years ago. So, after discussing
different aspects of the murder, Fabian, Webb and Spooner started
speculating as to what kind of person would have committed
this crime. Sergeant Webb was a very hardened, very experienced
London officer, and he immediately suggested that it was the

(16:40):
work of a maniac. Who else would attack and mutilate
an old and defenseless farm worker, And of course Fabian agreed,
I'm pretty sure we all can agree with that. Right then,
the four hundred and ninety three inhabitants of the village
all received a visit from Fabian and Webb and were
asked to account for their movement on the day of

(17:00):
the murder. There were about four thousand statements taken and
traveling people were traced and interviewed as far away as
Somerset and Yorkshire. Twenty nine samples of hair, blood and
clothing were analyzed and every avenue was explored. Fabian eventually
met a wall of silence in town because all the

(17:22):
villagers were being uncooperative. One man was overheard saying that
Walton was dead and buried, so there was nothing to
worry about now. Usually people want to help the police,
especially if a victim is vulnerable, but local people avoided
participation in the murder investigation, and they seemed unbothered by

(17:42):
the fact that there was this maniac potentially on the
loose running around that killed one of their own local
citizens in this village, and Fabian commented that when he
tried to interview the people in the village, they would
lower their eyes and they were reluctant to speak, except
for when they would talk about the bad crops, and

(18:05):
they also would talk about a heifer that had died
in a ditch recently, so the cops are frustrated and
Fabian started to believe he would never solve the case
until the local detective, Alex Spooner started talking about a theory,
and this changed the entire direction of the case. So

(18:26):
Detective Inspector Alex Spooner was a local guy, which meant
he had detailed knowledge of that local area, and he
immediately recognized the ritualistic nature of the murder of Charles Walton.
He also understood that the area around Meon Hill was
rich with stories about witchcraft and the occult, and Spooner

(18:49):
drew Fabian's attention to a book on local folklore. It
was called Folklore, Old Customs and Superstitions in shakespeare Land,
and it was written by J. Harvey Bloom, who was
a local vicar in nineteen twenty nine. From what I saw,
it was first published in nineteen thirty. Spooner had underlined
a passage in the book which told of how in

(19:11):
eighteen seventy five, a weak minded young man killed a
woman named Anne Turner with a hayfork because he believed
she had bewitched him. We'll talk more about all that
a little bit later, but further on in the book,
another page had been marked.

Speaker 1 (19:28):
The story told of how.

Speaker 2 (19:30):
In eighteen eighty five, a plowboy by the name of
Charles Walton had encountered a large black dog nine days
in a row while on his way home from work.
On the very last occasion, the dog supposedly turned into
a headless woman. And we will also talk more about
that later when we get into some of the theories

(19:52):
and stuff like that. So by the time Fabian had
finished reading all of this, he had to acknowledge that
Charles Walton may have been murdered because he was a
practicing witch and not for some old cheap ten watch
that he had. Fabian reluctantly turned to that witchcraft theory

(20:12):
and discovered that according to the old Julian calendar in
use until the Middle Ages, February fourteenth actually fell on
February second, which, according to local superstition, was traditionally the
best day for a blood sacrifice. At this point of
the year, the earth was just beginning to recover from
the winter, and a ritual sacrifice was seen as a

(20:34):
way to ensure a good harvest that year. One of
the last lines of inquiry was about Walton's past, but
nothing was really found there, except for the strange disappearance
of Walton's money. When Walton's wife had died in nineteen
twenty seven, she left him a sum of two hundred
and ninety seven pounds, which in today's money in US

(20:57):
dollar would be about fifty five hundred dollars, and this
was a pretty considerable amount of money for the time.
He was known to have placed it in a building society,
but when police investigated, the balance was only two pounds
eleven shillings, And just so we know, one shilling is
one twentieth of a pound, so there's twenty shillings in

(21:18):
a pound. It was estimated that his weekly bills were
no more than two pounds per week, and he had
worked all his life and been very frugal, so he
had saved a lot of money and he was still
making money on top of that. Police did find sixty
shillings in his house, but the remainder of his money
was never accounted for and no explanation was ever given

(21:41):
for its disappearance. Other inquiries of the Midland Bank revealed
that Walton had deposited two hundred and twenty seven pounds
and ten shillings in June of nineteen thirty, but that
by nineteen thirty nine his money had dwindled down to
eleven pounds, eleven shillings and ninepence, and there are two

(22:04):
hundred and forty pence in a pound. So Walton had
made numerous withdrawals during the years in between those nine years,
but there was never a withdrawal bigger than ten pounds.
So now that we know Charles Walton, we know the
scene of the crime, we know a little bit of
local lore, which we're going to talk about more later.

(22:25):
Let's talk about some facts and theories now, so we're
going to go from kind of least plausible to most
plausible kind of. So the first one is a pow
close to Lower Quinton was an Italian prisoner of war camp.
As the war was coming to a close, the prisoners
were given just a super huge level of freedom. They

(22:49):
were used as cheap labor on local farms, and the
prisoners were allowed to travel to and from their place
of work unsupervised. On the afternoon of the day of
the murder, some prison had gone into Stratford to see
a play, while others had gone to the movies. Within
days and arrest was made an Italian prisoner of war
from a nearby camp at Long Marston had been seen

(23:12):
hiding in a ditch on Meon Hill with blood on
his hands. After questioning, they found out the man was
just a poacher who had regularly escaped from the camp
to supplement his diet with a few rabbits. He was
returned to the camp and he was not charged. So
they kept on searching. Now, if one of the POWs

(23:34):
came upon Charles as he worked alone and murdered him.
The only thing missing from Walton's body was a cheap
tin pocket watch. And I don't think any of them
are going to risk murdering this dude in such a brutal,
fucking manner, or at all for that matter, over a
worthless watch. The next person we got is George Higgins.

(23:54):
He was seventy two years old at the time. He
was from Fairview, Lower Quinton. He was employed by mister
Vallander of Upper Quinton. He was a best friend of
Charles Walton and was working in a barn less than
three hundred yards from where his body was found.

Speaker 1 (24:11):
A rumor had it.

Speaker 2 (24:12):
That the old men had a falling out right around
Christmas time. You know, a couple like a month, month
and a half, two months before and Fabian speculated that
Higgins could have made his way across the fields unseen
and killed Walton, but he doubted that a seventy two
year old man would have had this strength to just

(24:32):
mount such an attack on somebody.

Speaker 1 (24:35):
I mean, it was a brutal.

Speaker 2 (24:37):
Brutal attack, and there was really no motive, you know.
I mean, yeah, they had a falling out, But how
many times you argue with your friends and you know
that you go over and kill him, You know, it's
a rare occasion. One of the next theories is that
it was a ritual murder. Margaret Murray, who was eighty
seven years old. She was the author of the popular,

(25:00):
much maligned book called the Witch Cault in Western Europe,
a study and anthropology. She believed the Walton murder was
more than likely a ritual act performed with the purpose
of replenishing the soil. Darren Charles, a historian from the
Folk Horror Revival Project, touched on some of the wilder

(25:22):
rumors that circulated, and he says, apparently the year before
Walton's death proved to be a difficult harvest and the
beer brewed from those crops was undrinkable. Walton was seen
as an unusual fellow who had bred natterjack toads in
his garden and teamed wild dogs.

Speaker 1 (25:41):
With just his voice.

Speaker 2 (25:43):
This might sound far fetched as a motive for murder,
but Darren Charles says it was much more logical in
the context of the time. It's a remote region reconnecting
with its ancient superstitions. Because of the dread and fears
of World War two, some of these locals were unsure
of the future, so they started looking backwards outside of

(26:05):
the Christian Church for philosophical guidance, and this was just
more appealing to them instead of the whole Christianity thing.
Also by where Walton's body was found is the Rollright
Stones and it's an ancient stone monument and the Burhill
iron Age hill fort, which give the whole region just

(26:28):
a sense of being ancient, magical, strange. Another person, Maria J.
Perez Quervo, who's a writer specializing in archaeology, insists these
stories were also being told when Walton was alive in
the nineteen thirties and early forties. She said the link
between rural communities pagan beliefs and ritual sacrifice was very

(26:52):
much in the zeitgeist when Walton was murdered, largely due
to the popularity of the Golden Bow by Sir James Fraser.

Speaker 1 (27:00):
She says.

Speaker 2 (27:01):
Fraser has traced a common template for a series of
myths and rituals from around the world, concluding that they
were part of a widespread belief in a solar god
king whose ritual killing ensured the fertility of the land,
and who would be reborn again in the spring to
start a new cycle. His work suggested that the apparently

(27:24):
inoffensive rituals performed in remote rural corners in Britain were
actually Pagans survivals. This proved inspiring for many authors working
on genre fiction, and also had an impact on the
way Walton's murder was reported and therefore in how the
case is remembered now. So the two reports that Fabian

(27:48):
wrote on the case in nineteen forty five and which
are preserved on the police file, make no mention of witchcraft,
ritualistic killing, black dogs, natterjack toads, or black blood sacrifices.
And remember that he wrote these reports and he never
mentioned anything about witchcraft ritualistic killing black dogs, natterjack toads,

(28:11):
or blood sacrifices. Those are in the police files that
he did, the two reports. That's important later when we
go down. But twenty five years later he wrote the
following that said, I advise anybody who is tempted at
any time to venture into black magic, witchcraft, shamanism, call

(28:33):
it what you will, to remember Charles Walton and to
think of his death, which was clearly the ghastly climax
of a pagan rite. There is no stronger argument for
keeping as far away as possible from the villains with
their swords, incense and mumbo jumbo. It is prudence on
which your future peace of mind and even your life

(28:56):
could depend. So you got a pretty far cry, you know,
from his police reports in nineteen forty five to what
he wrote twenty five years later. And to be honest,
like when you're writing shit in a report, especially at
that time, you know, out of London, Scotland yard, I mean,
would you put that kind of shit in a report though,

(29:18):
because you're gonna get ostracized, Probably made fun of. It's
hard telling. That's all speculation on my behalf, But pretty
big difference there among the theories and rumors that surrounded
this case in subsequent years are that it was claimed
that locals believed that Walton was a witch whose powers
were feared by some of the villagers, and two examples

(29:41):
cited were the failure of the nineteen forty four harvest
and the death of Potters Heffer on the day before,
which would have been February thirteenth. It was claimed that
this alleged witchcraft led him to be murdered in a
ritualistic manner, which involved his blood soaking into the ground
to replenish the soil's fertility. Criminology professor David Wilson very

(30:06):
much agrees with that assessment, referencing Dennis Wheatley's nineteen thirty
four novel The Devil Rides Out as another example of
a horror story that kind of lurked in the public
subconscious around the time of the murder. The number one
suspect regarding Walton's death, Alfred Potter, was a farmer that

(30:26):
was involved in a financial dispute with Walton. So David
Wilson says, the simplest solutions are usually the best, and
I believe the true culprit Potter alluded to a number
of local witchcraft conspiracies to lay a false trail, and
a lot of that, Wilson states, you know, it helped
the media kind of influence the case as well. He

(30:51):
also says, here was this rural backwater, so of course
the media was going to be interested in stirring up witchcraft,
headless horseman.

Speaker 1 (30:59):
And a cult.

Speaker 2 (31:01):
Because the media was metropolitan and quote unquote enlightened. They
preyed on the cliches of locality. The whole idea of
evil lurking in these tiny, beautiful hamlets was a trope
that existed very heavily across the nineteen forties and even
past that. And you could say, detective Fabian got too

(31:23):
lost in the noise. That's probably the biggest factor to
why it remained unsolved. You heard David Wilson, you know,
say that as a quoted phrase. There is a good
reason that Fabian got lost in the noise. And again
we'll talk about that here in a little bit. In
the BBC documentary The Power of the Witch, Walton's own

(31:45):
niece describes what was reported in the press as witchcraft
being ridiculous and none of it was true. The date
of Walton's murder February fourteenth was the date that ancient
druids allegedly made blood sackrifice rituals for good crops, in
the belief that if life forces taken out of the earth,

(32:07):
it must be returned. The crops of nineteen forty four
were really bad. In the spring of nineteen forty five
it wasn't looking much better either, and Walton was known
to harness his huge toads to toy plows and send
them running into the fields.

Speaker 1 (32:25):
Why this is interesting is.

Speaker 2 (32:27):
Because I've done an episode on Isabel Gaudy. You can
go back and listen to that. I think was a
two parter. In sixteen sixty two, the Scottish witch Isabel
Goudy confessed to doing the exact same thing in order
to blast the crops.

Speaker 1 (32:43):
And maybe someone thought Walton was.

Speaker 2 (32:46):
Using witchcraft to blast his neighbors crops as well. Now, significantly,
Walton's blood had been allowed to drain into the ground. Now,
according to old beliefs, a witch's power could be neutralized
by blooding, which is literally just letting the blood run
all the way out. Many accused witches bled to death

(33:10):
from cutting and slashing, usually done to the forehead. The
practice was done in certain parts of England from the
sixteenth century up to the nineteenth century. So pretty weird shit, right,
And it gets a lot better too. But before we
go any further, let's go ahead and take a small

(33:32):
commercial break.

Speaker 1 (33:34):
You guys know the routine.

Speaker 2 (33:35):
You can either fast forward, you can sit through it,
grab yourself another drink, whatever the case might be. I'll
meet you back here in a few minutes. So, going
in with the ritualistic murder type theory, we've come to
the point where Charles Walton may have been a cunning man.

(33:55):
Charles Walton was unlikely to be the devil worshiping wi
that some accused him of being, but there is a
very strong possibility he was one of the last cunning
folk practicing low magic in nineteen forties Britain. As a
cunning man, Walton would have been very respected in his community. Now,

(34:16):
there's few areas of Britain that have a deeper association
with traditional witchcraft than Warwickshire, and privately it was accepted
that Walton was involved with the various covens operating in
the area. Now, despite this, it seems that Walton had few,
if any enemies and most of the village was friendly
with them. A cunning man would have a deep understanding

(34:39):
of folk magic, cures and medicine. He would use this
knowledge and skills to combat evil spirits and bad witchcraft.
He would also heal the sick and offer charms and
spells for a small fee. Cunning folk were predominantly male
and were seen as useful people with a deep understanding
of the countryside and in affinity with nature. They were

(35:02):
valued in the villages of rural Britain. He was very
well versed in country lore. He seemed to know a
lot about the old ways of the countryside. Charles Walton
was also rumored to have many many gifts. He was
widely known to have clairvoyant powers and also have lesser
control over animals. It was claimed he could talk to

(35:26):
birds and direct them to go wherever he wanted simply
by pointing, and they would eat from his hand without fear,
except dogs. He feared dogs. He also bred large toads,
which were called natterjack toads, and during a search of
his residence after the murder, there were a number of

(35:47):
natterjack toads found kept in the garden, and according to
the Annalls of British witchcraft. They were creatures used to
blight crops since the sixteenth century. Why would anyone want
to murder the old man in such a ritualistic manner?
And that answer might be in a rumor that had

(36:10):
made the rounds of the village where he lived. In
the months before his death. One local kid reported he
had seen Walton harness a toad to him many toy plow,
which meant he was cursing the crops and cursing the earth. Basically,
everything that this toad in this mini plow touched it would.

Speaker 1 (36:29):
Curse the crops.

Speaker 2 (36:31):
Charles Walton had been accused of blasting by some of
the local villagers, and blasting was a form of witchcraft
used to hex crops and livestock. Lower Quinton had suffered
a dreadful harvest in the year before Walton's death, so
it was not really surprising that he became the subject

(36:51):
of the local gossip. Now, the ritual of blasting involved
driving natterjack toads across the land to strip it of.

Speaker 1 (36:59):
All the good things.

Speaker 2 (37:00):
The garden of Walton's cottage was overrun with these toads,
and one villager even claimed that old Charlie kept a
toy plow to which he harnessed the creatures before they
did his bidding, and in the days before Walton's death,
two heifers had been discovered dead. Did one of the
local farmers believe the heckts was on them again? Yeah,

(37:24):
that's a fucking possibility. Charles was killed using a method
to traditionally used to murder those suspected of witchcraft. Walton
was stayed, which sta n g ed. It's either staged
or staged.

Speaker 1 (37:40):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (37:40):
That meant his neck was slashed and his body pinned
down by a pitchfork to prevent him from rising from
the dead. His blood was left to drain into the
ground and replenish the soil that he had cursed. Pretty
interesting shit, huh Yeah. Next one up is the mysterious

(38:01):
Mean Hill. As far back as living memory, the hill
and its residents have been associated with a cault and
black magic rituals. Its very existence is said to have
been the result of a row between the devil and
the monks from nearby Evesham Abbey. One version of the
story has an irate devil kicking a boulder at the

(38:23):
abbey in a bid to destroy it. His plan was
thwarted by the power of prayer, and the boulder fell
to the ground as Cleveden Hill. Another twist on the
legend has him throwing a lump of earth, and again
the power of prayer shielded the newly built abbey and
the clod fell to earth as Mean Hill. Now the Celts,

(38:46):
who occupied the area centuries before, believe that Meon Hill
was the resting place of Aran, the god of the underworld.
Iran was guarded by a pack of spectral black dog
who went hunting with him as he searched for unsuspecting
mortals to populate his kingdom. To this very day, witnesses

(39:09):
claim to encounter black dogs on Mean Hill all the time.
They are known as a harbinger of death and destruction,
and the legend of black dogs was to have particular
significance in Charles Walton's life. And if you remember my
Appalachian Stories episode, we talk about black dogs in there

(39:29):
as well. So there are a lot of weird stories
associated with Meon Hill. It rises above the hamlet of
Upper Quinton and the flat of Avon Plain, and down
at its foundation which are rippling are ancient ridge and
furrow fields and at the top is an iron age fort.

(39:49):
It's six hundred and thirty seven feet high. Its summit
is often swirled by.

Speaker 1 (39:55):
Clouds and stuff like that.

Speaker 2 (39:58):
So let's talk about these black and the ghostly ladies.
One of the stories recounted in the book Given to
Fabian by Spooner features the story of a young boy
called Charles Walden. The story takes place in the area
where the murdered Charles Walton lived and puts him at
the right age in eighteen eighty five to be the

(40:18):
boy in the book. On eight consecutive nights, fourteen year
old Charles Walton encountered a ghostly black dog on his
way home from the farm where he was working. When
Charles told the farmer, he scoffed at him and told
him to try to forget what he had seen. Walton
was unable to do this, because the dog appeared once

(40:39):
more for the ninth day and the final time. This time,
the dog walked quietly next to him for a few
minutes before slowly transforming into a woman. The woman wore
a black silk dress and a hooded cape. When she
pulled down her hood, she appeared completely headless. So Walton,

(41:00):
who was terrified ran home, only to find out that
his sister was dying from a sudden, unknown illness. From
that time onwards, some of the young Walton's neighbors were
suspicious that he had strange powers gifted by the devil,
which allowed him to predict the future and practice witchcraft,

(41:21):
and that is why they thought of Charles Walton in
the village as a cunning man.

Speaker 1 (41:27):
The legend of.

Speaker 2 (41:28):
The black dog also played a very eerie part in
Fabian's investigation. In the first few days of the investigation,
a police car hit and killed a black dog. Later
that day, a similar black dog was found hanging from
a tree branch by its collar, close to where Walton's
body was found. Fabian also recounts seeing a black dog

(41:52):
himself while he searched for clues at the murder site.
Shortly afterwards, a young boy came up the hill and
he seemed to be looking for something. Fabian asked whether
he had lost his dog or not. The boy looked
at him kind of puzzled, and Fabian explained that he
had just seen a large black hound, and when he
did that boy turned completely pale white, and he took

(42:17):
this huge breath and he ran as fast as he
could down the hill. And it should be noted that
this time of the year was the Roman feast of Lupercalia,
when dogs were sacrificed to ensure good crops.

Speaker 1 (42:33):
So why would there.

Speaker 2 (42:34):
Be a dead black hound hanging by its collar near
the site where Charles Walton's body was found and he
was bled out and killed in a way that is
traditionally used to kill witches. It's pretty interesting, huh. Now,
let's talk about this other similar murder that happened in

(42:55):
eighteen seventy five. So on September fifteenth, eighteen seventy.

Speaker 1 (43:00):
Five, at about eight o'clock.

Speaker 2 (43:01):
In the evening, a woman named Anne Tenant, who was
either seventy nine or eighty years old, she left her
house to buy a loaf of bread. She was a
resident of long Compton, which was about fifteen miles from
Lower Quinton. On her way back, she met some farm
workers returning home from harvesting in the fields. One of
the group was a local man named James Hayward. He

(43:25):
had known Anne's family for many many years. Hayward was
very simple minded and he was kind of seen as
the village idiot. And it is known that he was
also drinking cider that night, so he was probably a
little drunk.

Speaker 1 (43:40):
But as they were.

Speaker 2 (43:42):
Walking by, without warning, he attacked Anne Tenant with a pitchfork,
stabbing her in the legs and head. A local farmer
named John Taylor heard what was going on and he
ran to try to help Anne, and he ended up
restraining Hayward until a constable arrived and Anne was taken
to her daughter's house, but died of her injuries around

(44:04):
eleven fifteen pm that night, roughly three hours after the attack.
Hayward claimed that Anne was a witch and that there
were other witches in the village whom he intended to
deal with in the very same way. So when asked
for his motive, John Hayward accused Anne Tenant of being
a witch who had put the evil eye on him,

(44:25):
and according to him, she was not the only witch
in the area, and if he had the opportunity, he
would have killed all of them if he could. He
thought he was acting for the good of the whole
community because Anne Turner had bewitched the cattle and the
land of local farmers. And that's literally a quote from him.
He said that he had pinned her to the ground

(44:48):
with a hay fork, before slashing her throat with a
bill hook in the form of a cross. It was
believed that this was it was believed that this was
the only way to prevent the dead wisd from rising
to the grave. He ended up going on trial, and
he was found not guilty of murder on the grounds
of insanity, and spent the rest of his life in

(45:09):
Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum. He is recorded as dying there
at the age of fifty nine in the first half
of eighteen ninety. A report in the Stratford Herald described
the event. On the night in question, between seven and
eight o'clock, the poor old woman left her cottage for
the purpose of going to a small shop in the

(45:31):
village for a loaf of bread. On her return she
met Heyward, who had just left his work in the
harvest fields, and who, without a word on either side,
attacked missus tennant with a fork which he was carrying,
inflicting such injuries upon her head and body that she
died in the course of three hours. In fact, had
it not been for the assistance of mister John Taylor,

(45:53):
a farmer who resided near where the attack took place,
he would have killed.

Speaker 1 (45:58):
Her on the spot.

Speaker 2 (45:59):
The only reason that can be assigned for the murder
is that Hayward, for some time past, had been under
the impression that he was influenced by witchcraft, and that
Missus Tenant and several other women in long Compton were witches,
and he was determined to rid the village of them.
In his book in nineteen o six, Clive Holland, in

(46:20):
his account of the Tenant murder, explained that using a
pitchfork and killing a witch was a relic of the
old Anglo saxon stockhung or sticking. It was believed to
be the only effective way to kill a witch and
neutralize any curses or spells. Holland points to the eerie
confession given by murderer Hayward, where he said I pinned

(46:43):
her to the ground with a hayfork before slashing her
throat with a bill hook in the form of a cross.
And although the courts did find Hayward insane and locked
him away for life, he was not on his own
with these beliefs. Reporting on the Walt case, The Illustrated
Police News said it was proved in evidence that fully

(47:06):
one third of the villagers believed in witchcraft. Then, on
February thirteenth, nineteen fifty four, the eve of the ninth
anniversary of Walton's murder, the Daily Mirror revisited the killing
of Antennant and the alleged similarity between that event and
Walton's murder. The report said, the police have found one

(47:28):
other link between the killings, but I am pledged not
to reveal it. There's a lot of stuff going on there,
you know. Next up in the Theories and Everything section,
we have an anonymous letter. One of the strangest twists
in the murder of Charles Walden was an anonymous letter
that was sent first to the police and then to

(47:49):
a local newspaper. In the letter, a Wolverhampton woman calling
herself Missus Jones, claimed to have been present when Charles
Walton was murdered. The woman suggested that she was part
of a coven of witches who gathered together to perform
the ritualistic sacrifice. The leader of the coven of witches,

(48:09):
she suggested, was the former lover of Aleister Crowley. Crowley
was infamous throughout Britain at this time for his occult
beliefs and practices. And had hundreds of followers across the country.
Missus Jones's account was discounted as fantasy by the police,
but it certainly helped consolidate the belief amongst the public

(48:32):
that witchcraft was involved in Walton's murder. Next up, we
have a seance that was held. By the early fifties,
the murder of Charles Walton remained unsolved, but that did
not mean that interest in the case had died down.
In nineteen fifty the respected egyptologist and anthropologist, doctor Margaret

(48:54):
Murray made a study of the murder. She was masquerading
as a tourist in going a painting holiday, and she
went around and started doing her own line of questioning,
and she concluded that Charles's death was almost certainly the
consequence of a black magic ritual involving local witches. Two

(49:15):
years later, Mills and Higginbotham from the Birmingham Physical Society
held a secret seance on Meon Hill on the anniversary
of Walton's death. Now, while the identity of the murderer
was not revealed, Walton was rumored to have left the
following message, I forgive, I forgive, I deserved what was

(49:37):
coming to me but not in such a brutal way. Next,
we have this really strange finding, and it is that
missing watch. The only item missing from Charles Walton's body
was that small tin watch, and it wasn't worth shit,
and he always carried.

Speaker 1 (49:55):
It with him.

Speaker 2 (49:56):
Now, Fabian very quickly realized that if he found that watch,
it could lead him to the killer, and he organized
a huge search of Walton's home to make sure it
wasn't there. After a number of searches failed to turn
up the watch, Fabian became convinced it had been stolen.
In August of nineteen sixty, during the demolition of outhouses

(50:19):
behind Charles Walton's cottage, a workman saw something shining and
he picked it up and it was found out to
be that old tin pocket watch. So later that day,
Walton's niece confirmed that it was the missing watch from
the day he died, but could give no explanation as
to how it had found its way to its hiding place.

(50:42):
When they opened the watch case, a small piece of
colored glass was found. Walton was known to have carried
this around with him and he never let it out
of his possession. The general consensus of opinion among the
villagers was that this was a piece of witch glass.
Witch Glass was used to deflect bad magic away from

(51:06):
a person or absorb any negative thoughts towards the owner.
If lost, it would always find its way back to
the person who it was charged with protecting. The odd
thing about this find was that the police had searched
the building shortly after the crime and found nothing, So
it appears that the killer must have returned at some

(51:28):
point later.

Speaker 1 (51:29):
To return the watch.

Speaker 2 (51:31):
And why had the murderer felt that it was necessary
to take such a huge risk in returning this watch
when he could have just as easily thrown it away,
buried it, done whatever else with it. But whoever that
was felt the need to return it now personally, it's
also a possibility that Walton forgot has watched that one day,

(51:55):
or he didn't take it with him. That's possibility as well. Obviously.
Now on to one of the biggest suspects and probably
the favorite amongst many people, Alfred Potter. He was forty
years old at the time of the murder and he
managed the furs for LL Potter and Company, which was

(52:15):
a company owned by his father, and he appears to
have been the last person to see Walton alive. Potter
was working in his own fields that morning and estimated
that he had seen Walton on the hillside at around
two pm. Now he just assumed it was Walton because
nobody else should have been on his land cutting any hedges.

(52:38):
Potter's behavior remained suspicious throughout the investigation. He gave various
contradictory accounts of his movements during that day. Potter's demeanor
was first noted when the police arrived at the scene.
He appeared overly agitated and anxious to leave the scene.
When Constable Leamasney arrived at seven oh five pm, he

(52:59):
knowed that Potter seemed very upset. He was shivering and
complained of being cold. Looking back, I think that Potter
appeared more worried than one would have expected him to be.
But Potter was also very used to slaughtering animals, so
he was probably less affected by the murder scene than

(53:21):
a lot of other guys. Constable Lamasny was also surprised
when Potter said he was going home before the Stratford
police turned up. He said his complaint of feeling cold
I considered a strange excuse from one who was used
to attending to animals at all hours and in all
kinds of.

Speaker 1 (53:41):
Weather, especially as the murdered man was.

Speaker 2 (53:44):
His own employee and had been murdered on his own land.
The Stratford police actually showed up just as Potter was leaving,
and one of the most damning pieces of evidence against
Potter was his claim that he sometimes paid Carrol's Walton
for hours he had not worked, but in fact it
was the opposite. Apparently there was a big fight between

(54:08):
the two when Walton had discovered that he was underpaying
him and he wanted his money.

Speaker 3 (54:15):
Now.

Speaker 1 (54:16):
At eleven pm on.

Speaker 2 (54:17):
February fourteenth, Detective Inspector Tombs took a statement from Alfred Potter.
Potter stated that he had been in the College arms
with Joseph Stanley, a farmer of white Cross Farm.

Speaker 1 (54:30):
Until noon that day.

Speaker 2 (54:33):
He had gone straight across to a small field adjoining
hill Ground and saw Walton walking about five hundred to
six hundred yards away. He said he noticed that Walton
had about six to ten yards of hedge left to cut,
and that when he found his body later that day,
about four additional yards of hedge had been cut, which

(54:54):
could be about half an hour's work.

Speaker 1 (54:58):
Here's my thing with that.

Speaker 2 (55:00):
How in the actual fuck are you gonna be five
to six hundred yards away notice a guy? You know,
I could see the assumption, you know, with assuming that
it's Walton, But you can't fucking tell me that from
five to six hundred yards away, you can look across
a field and be like, oh, yeah, yeah, I'd say

(55:21):
he's got about six to ten yards a hedge left
to cut.

Speaker 1 (55:24):
Yeah, he's about done.

Speaker 2 (55:26):
It's like, nah, bro, that is a long ways away.
I mean, think about it relatively, like that's five to
six football fields, you know. Potter also stated that he
knew that it was Walton's habit to stop for lunch
around eleven am, and that he would then work continuously
until about four pm. He described Walton as an inoffensive

(55:49):
type of man, but one who would speak his mind
if necessary. Potter stated that he had been at the
farm for about five years and had known Walton for
all that time. He had employed Walton casually for the
last nine months, and said that Walton had worked when
the weather permitted. Walton had been engaged on hedging for

(56:11):
the previous few months and Hill Ground was the last
field needing attention, so A few days later, on February seventeenth,
Potter was interviewed for a second time, but this time
by Detective Sergeant Webb. In this instance, Potter said he
would have gone over to see Walton at Hill Ground

(56:31):
on February fourteenth were it not for the fact that
he had a heifer and a ditch nearby that he
needed to attend to.

Speaker 1 (56:39):
He claimed he had.

Speaker 2 (56:40):
Gone straight home, arriving there at about twelve forty pm,
and then went to attend to the heifer.

Speaker 1 (56:47):
However, the heifer.

Speaker 2 (56:49):
Was found to have drowned in Doomsday Ditch on February thirteenth,
and was not removed from the first until three thirty
pm on that Valentine's Day next day, and this is
almost three hours after Potter claimed to have gone to
attend to it. Potter's statement about the heifer was contradicted

(57:09):
by his statement on February twenty third that he had
gone home, read the paper and then helped Charles Batchelor
to pulp. Manigold's Fabian made a comment that Potter is
undoubtedly lying about his actions at this critical time, but
the reason for these lies can, for the present only

(57:31):
be a matter for conjecture. Fabian's cynicism about Potter's activities
between noon and twelve forty pm was increased by the
fact that he variously stated he had seen Walton working
in the distance at twelve ten pm, twelve fifteen pm,
and twelve twenty pm, ultimately telling the inquest that he

(57:55):
had seen someone stationary at twelve thirty pm. Fabian commented
that thus we have Potter's story gradually changing from seeing
Charles Walton working at hedge cutting at twelve ten pm
to seeing a man standing stationary in the field at
twelve thirty pm. Potter's statements about seeing Walton at work

(58:19):
invariably said that he was in his shirt sleeves, but
when the body was found he was wearing a jacket.
Underneath his jacket. He was wearing a shirt, but the
sleeves were cut off above the elbow, which means Potter
could not have seen Walton in his shirt sleeves. In

(58:41):
Fabian's view, even if Potter had merely seen Walton with
his jacket off, it seems improbable he would have worked
in shirt sleeves at twelve twenty and then put his
jacket on, unless he had decided to go home. Potter
stated that Walton had usually worked about four days each week,

(59:02):
but never in wet weather. He said he paid him
eighteen pence per hour, which there's twelvepence in a shilling,
and he usually paid at the end of each fortnight,
although sometimes.

Speaker 1 (59:15):
By the week. He said that he left it to.

Speaker 2 (59:18):
Walton to say how many hours he had completed, and
implied that Walton was sometimes paid for hours he had
not actually worked. He had last paid Walton for the
fortnight ending February tenth, when he had given him two
pounds and fifteen shillings. Potter stated that on the day
of the murder, he had left the college arms and

(59:40):
gone across to a field known as cas Lays to
see some sheep and to feed some calves. When he
reached the field, it was twelve twenty pm, and he
then saw Walton working in his shirt sleeves. He was
sure of this because it was the first time he
had seen him so dressed, and had said to himself,

(01:00:02):
he's getting on.

Speaker 1 (01:00:03):
With it today.

Speaker 2 (01:00:05):
Potter added that he would have gone over to see
Walton were it not for the fact that he had
a heifer and a ditch near by. The needed attention right.
He went straight home and arrived there at about twelve
forty pm. He then went to attend the heifer. Then,
on February twentieth, police Constable Lamasny was at the Firs
and mentioned the fact that the police were still hoping

(01:00:27):
to take fingerprints from the murder weapons. Potter said he
had previously mentioned to the police that he had touched
the murder weapons. He said he had touched the handle
of the slash hook and possibly the pitchfork when he
first came across the body, although he claimed he had
already mentioned this to the police. He said he had

(01:00:48):
handled the weapons in response to a comment from Harry
Beasley when he said, you'd better have a look to
make sure he is gone. But this was the first
time he had made any kind of claim life this
to the police, and Beasley strongly denied any question that
he had asked Potter to make sure.

Speaker 1 (01:01:07):
Walton was dead.

Speaker 2 (01:01:09):
Beasley said it was obvious that he was dead and
that Potter did not touch the weapons in his presence.
Beasley said he was confident that Potter realized Walton was
dead from the moment he saw Walton's body. When Harry
Beasley was interviewed. He said that Potter had a reputation
as a decent man to work for. Fabian commented that

(01:01:32):
Potter produced his explanation only when Lemasney asked the question
of fingerprints. He considered that Potter had gone to great
pains to explain away any of his fingerprints that might
be found upon the weapons, but no prints were ever
found on these weapons, which suggests that they might have

(01:01:53):
been wiped clean. Missus Potter had displayed a considerable annoyance
at this revelation, stating that the police were bound to
suspect him if his prints were on the murder weapon.
Alfred Potter meanwhile told Lemasny that the murder was the
work of a fascist from the camp. A short time later,

(01:02:13):
a serviceman came to the door and asked for Potter,
who was in the yard. Le Masny recorded that when
Potter came in, he said that soldier just told me
that the military police at the camp have caught an
Italian coming out with a suit of clothes and detained
him and sent him for the civil police, who came

(01:02:34):
dashing out. They have taken him away with him. Potter
affected great happiness, and his wife became almost hysterical with delight.
Also in February twentieth, after Fabian and Webb had returned
to London, the police constable who had relieved le Masny
and stood guard over the murder scene, reported that Potter

(01:02:56):
had returned to Hill Ground soon after first life on
February fifteenth. The policemen warned Potter away from the actual
sight of the murder. They exchanged a few pleasantries about
the coldness of the weather, and Potter had given the
constable a player's cigarette and then left. So this revelation

(01:03:17):
brought Fabian and Webb back to another interview with Potter
and some questions about why he didn't tell them earlier
about visiting the scene. The next morning, the police took
statements from two former employees of Potter's. William George Died
and George Purnell. Both confirmed that from time to time
Potter had experienced difficulties in paying their wages. Another guy,

(01:03:41):
Joseph Stanley, confirmed that Potter had assisted him with the
castration of two calves on the morning of February fourteenth,
and that they had subsequently visited the College Arms, where
Potter had drunk two glasses of guinness between eleven forty
five am and noon. Damn bro, not to break the

(01:04:02):
tension here, but too fucking will pint two glasses Againnis
in fifteen minutes. Man, God, I'm not a heavy beer guy,
so that just amazes me. Just so it's noted. Those
two employees that I talked about, they ended up fucking Quinton.

Speaker 1 (01:04:17):
We're like, screw this, screw this, dude, We're out of here.

Speaker 2 (01:04:20):
And Fabian believed that both of them had possibly realized
the nature of the man for whom they were working for,
and he also wondered if Bachelor had compromised himself by
stating that he had seen Potter at twelve forty pm,
and the key for the police was establishing Potter's movements
between twelve noon when he parted company with Joseph Stanley

(01:04:42):
at the College Arms and twelve forty pm when Charles
Bachelor said he saw him at the first So we've
got a good forty minute gap right here. But despite
Potter changing his story in various ways numerous times, Fabian
concluded that there was no real evidence to connect him
with the murder itself, and no reasonable motive can be

(01:05:04):
found for committing it. Fabian found that there is no
evidence that Potter was violent or that he and Walton
had ever argued. He described Potter as morose and sullen
at his interviews, although even when closely interrogated, he never
lost his temper and was civil. He wrote that Potter

(01:05:25):
was unkempt and on the surface dull witted, and he says,
I am convinced he is far from that, and Fabian
stated that he was a man of considerable strength and
an extremely cunning individual. Now, although a number of writers
have suggested that Walton had lent Potter money and its

(01:05:45):
repayment was overdue, there is no proof that this was
the case, and this was vehemently denied by Walton's niece Edith.
Edith claimed that Potter stated the following as they made
their way to the hill ground with Harry Beasley on
the day of the murder. She says that Potter said,
I have to do.

Speaker 1 (01:06:04):
The milky on a Wednesday.

Speaker 2 (01:06:06):
I came to the field to cut some hay at
twelve noon and saw your uncle at his work. Then
Edith stated that she had never heard Walton say he
had ever lent anyone any money, and she had not seen.

Speaker 1 (01:06:20):
Any IOUs now.

Speaker 2 (01:06:22):
According to Fabian's initial report, Potter stated on the twenty
third that after his visit to Caxlay, he had come home.
He had then asked how long dinner would be and
his wife had replied not long. So when Potter heard this,
he had gone to help Bachelor at around twelve forty
pm and returned at one oh five pm. Bachelor also

(01:06:46):
confirmed that Potter had come to help him at about
twelve forty pm, and both men had gone to look
at the church clock.

Speaker 1 (01:06:54):
And saw that it was one pm.

Speaker 2 (01:06:57):
So on February twenty seventh, Fabian asked that inquiries be
made to Stubbs and Bradstreet about any debts recorded against
Alfred Potter or ll Potter and Company, Farmers of Camden, Gloucestershire.
I hope by seth that right out, which was you
know Alfred Potter's father, Levi Potter, was the licensee of

(01:07:20):
the Ligon arms in Shipping Camden, and it was confirmed
that there were no such debts. Fabian also asked for
inquiries to be made at the Ministry of Agriculture and
Fisheries about the result of a test wages investigation made
on January twelfth, nineteen forty five at First Farm by

(01:07:42):
Inspector R. G. Elliott, who was apparently reluctant to reveal
the information to Fabian without authority from his headquarters. Potter's
suggestion that he might occasionally pay Walton for hours he
had not worked was disproved by an exist examination of
the sums he had intended for wages from LL Potter

(01:08:04):
and Company and those he had paid to Walton. In reality,
Potter was claiming more than he needed to pay his
employee and he was pocketing the difference. So Fabian's comment
was that Potter, by his own admission, is guilty of
claiming more wages than were due, and there is no

(01:08:26):
doubt that he was making a good thing out of
Walton's employment by him. Then we fast forward about a
month on March twentieth, at the inquest on Charles Walton.

Speaker 1 (01:08:38):
Again, in his initial.

Speaker 2 (01:08:40):
Crime report, Fabian recorded that Potter had told the coroner
that he had seen someone in shirt sleeves in his
field at twelve thirty pm and that they were stationary.

Speaker 1 (01:08:52):
So as you can see a lot of shit going on.

Speaker 2 (01:08:56):
With Alfred Potter here, man, So let's take another little
break before we start talking about some myths. You guys
know the routine. We'll be back here in a few minutes.
You can hit the fast forward button or take this
time to take a break. I'll see it back here
in a few So some of these myths. First one,

(01:09:18):
as Ann Tenant was murdered in the same way as Walton,
the claims that Anne was pinned to the ground with
a pitchfork or slashed with a bill hook are pure invention.
She was attacked in the view of several witnesses, and
the only similarity with Walton's murder was the fact that
a pitchfork was used in both instances. Now, I will

(01:09:38):
openly admit I'm not one hundred percent sure that is
actually a myth, because the information that I stated above
about that uh, James fucking Hayward guy, those were legitimate
quotes from the newspaper or telegraph, whatever you want to
call it, from back in the day, and a lot
of them were direct quotes from James hay himself and

(01:10:01):
also people who were in court and shit. So I'm
fifty to fifty on whether or not that's actually myth.
But I still had to put it out there because
somebody apparently thinks it's pure invention, but there's literally newspaper
fucking evidence in James Hayward himself saying like what he did.

(01:10:22):
Another one is Walton was the boy and the Story
of the Black Dog. There is no evidence that the
Charles Walton mentioned in Bloom's book was one and the
same as the murdered Charles Walton. The latter had three
older sisters and two younger brothers. If the Charles Walton
and the story was the same person as the murder victim,

(01:10:44):
he would need to have a sister who died during
eighteen eighty five. However, his sisters, Mary Anne and Martha
Walton both married in eighteen ninety one and lived for
some years thereafter, while Harriet, who was Charles's half sister,
was still alive in nineteen oh one. Consequently, the story

(01:11:05):
must have been related to another Charles Walton, unless Emma,
his mother, gave birth to a fourth daughter between the
April eighteen eighty one census and the end of eighteen
eighty five. I will say that particular couple paragraphs there,
I'm not I can't remember exactly where I got that information.

(01:11:28):
I'll be perfectly honest with you because I have a
fuck load of sources, but there is no source cited
for that information. They do cite a census record. They
do say in eighteen forty one. In that census it
was taken on June seventh, eighteen forty one. It conveniently

(01:11:49):
records Charles's mother as being just nine months old, implying
that she was born around August or September of eighteen forty.
In April of eighteen eighty one, she would have been
almost forty one years old without having given birth, at
least to the oldest child for some five or six years.

(01:12:09):
It is highly unlikely that she did so during the
next five years, especially since a detailed study of the birth, marriage,
and death records held by the Office for National Statistics
has failed to produce any likely Walton burths or deaths
being registered in the ships In or Stratford upon Avon

(01:12:29):
areas during this period. Again, they are citing a census,
but the source for that information in particular is not cited.
So it's basically like I could fucking write a few
paragraphs and say something is not true and not cite

(01:12:50):
my source and just say, now there's a census here
which you can fucking look up the census.

Speaker 1 (01:12:55):
That's not the issue.

Speaker 2 (01:12:56):
But how do I explain this? You guys are understanding
what I'm saying, I hope, like they're saying it's bullshit
and they're citing a census, but they're also saying, okay,
like it's highly unlikely it could have happened. She could
have had another kid. There could have been another child
in those five years. We're not one hundred percent sure,

(01:13:17):
but according to census records, they don't show up. You
know what, Census records are not fucking that accurate, dude,
Like they can be depending on where you're at, what
the year was, and all that shit. I don't ever
do a census. Fuck those people. I never fill out
a census record ever. Like I'm a ghost out here, man.

(01:13:37):
But anyway, I just had to had to state that.
Another one is that Walton was murdered close to a
druid stone circle and a ceremony. Fabian stated in his
book Fabian of the Yard, one of my most memorable
murder cases was at the village of Lower Quinton, near
the stone druid circle of the Whispering Nights. They where

(01:14:00):
a man had been killed by a reproduction of a
ceremony on Saint Valentine's Eve.

Speaker 1 (01:14:07):
Gerald B.

Speaker 2 (01:14:08):
Gardner stated in his book The Meaning of Witchcraft that
the Whispering Knights are not a circle. They are about
twelve miles away, as the crow flies from Lower Quinton.
Nor was Charles Walton killed on Saint Valentine's Eve, and
as no one knows for certain just what the druid
ceremonies were, it is impossible to say that his death

(01:14:30):
was a reproduction of one. Apart from these details, the
description is accurate. Another myth supposedly is that Fabian met
a wall of silence over the crime. The police took
numerous statements from individuals, and while Fabian was happy in
later years to suggest that he had met a wall
of silence, the most he would say in nineteen forty

(01:14:52):
five was that the natives of Upper and Lower Quinton
and the surrounding district are of a secretive dispo position,
and they do not take easily to strangers. But you know,
the truth maybe that no one had seen anything and
they really didn't have anything to fucking say. But there
are other statements that I, you know, had said, you know,

(01:15:15):
towards the in the investigation part of the episode. I mean,
you know, I come from a small town. You know,
if somebody from a huge city came questioning us, yeah,
we ain't gonna say shit either. You know, I can
understand the vulnerability part. It's like a nice old man.
Everybody respected him. But if there really was a third
of the village that believed that he was a witch

(01:15:37):
and somebody was doing good trying to get him better crops,
you know, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:15:43):
I guess you just never know. You know, maybe Alfred Potter.

Speaker 2 (01:15:46):
Took it upon himself and said, fuck it, I'm just
gonna do everybody a favor, you know, orrioed him money
or something. I don't know, because I mean the fact
that Alfred Potter too is like claiming more money from
the company and pocketing the difference just because tends to
make me think that he might have had some fucking
debts somewhere.

Speaker 1 (01:16:07):
But when they did the.

Speaker 2 (01:16:08):
Inquiries, there's no debts. But that was all the paper,
you know, that was all through the banks. There's no
debts through the banks or on paper. You know, this
dude could fucking owe money two villages away for gambling
or you know, whatever the case. Might be, and obviously
that speculation on my behalf, but you guys get the point.
So final thoughts here. As the inquiry drew to a close,

(01:16:33):
Fabian took one last walk up the hill to the
side of the murder, and he recalled in his memoirs
that it was a bleak and lonely place. Now reluctantly,
Fabian and Webb returned to London, and they were no
closer to figuring out who murdered Charles Walton. And every

(01:16:53):
modern police method had been used, but it seemed that
Britain's best detective had been beaten by a seemingly motiveless killing.
The inquest on Charles Walton gave the cause of death
as murder by person or persons unknown, and he was
buried in the churchyard at Lower Quinton. The churchyard was

(01:17:17):
recently landscaped and the headstones removed, so that now there
is no trace of Charles Walton at all, and the
events of February nineteen forty five have pretty much all
been forgotten. Now, long after the case was forgotten, Superintendent
Alex Spooner continued his own personal hunt for the killer.

(01:17:39):
He remained convinced that the killer was a local man
and soon became a familiar figure in the village. Every year,
on the anniversary of the murder, Spooner would climb to
the scene of the crime and then walk around the village,
hoping to find a clue that had been missed before.
Even after his retirement from the force, he continued to
visit at the village in the hope that maybe one

(01:18:02):
of those days the killer would just make a mistake
and give himself away. As of today, Charles Walton's murder
remains unsolved, and is likely to remain unsolved.

Speaker 1 (01:18:14):
The debate is still.

Speaker 2 (01:18:15):
Open as to whether the crime was an occult ritual,
a witchcraft killing, or just an argument over money that
got out of hand. And perhaps it is fitting to
leave the last word to the celebrated investigator Robert Fabian,
who ultimately tried but failed to crack this case, and
he said, I advise anybody who is tempted at any

(01:18:37):
time to venture into black magic, witchcraft, shamanism, call it
what you will, to remember Charles Walton and to think
of his death, which was clearly the ghastly climax of
a pagan rite. There is no stronger argument for keeping
as far away as possible from the villains with their swords,
incense and mumbo jumbo. It is prudence on which your

(01:19:00):
future peace of mind and even your life could depend.
And that was in his book, The Anatomy of Crime.
If you guys want to read some good fucking detective shit,
get that book. Get Robert Fabian The Anatomy of Crime,
because this dude legitimately was a bad ass detective and
it is. It's definitely well worth to read. So if

(01:19:24):
you go to visit the village today, you can't help
but notice the older residents are still reluctant to talk
about Walton's death, and some of those that will talk
suggests that a cover up may have taken place, And you.

Speaker 1 (01:19:40):
Know, there's certainly the suggestion that.

Speaker 2 (01:19:42):
Some people know more than what they will admit, But
I don't think we'll ever really know the truth.

Speaker 1 (01:19:51):
But with all of.

Speaker 2 (01:19:54):
That being said, it's a good long episode to kick
off twenty twenty Fourth's good to be back behind this
microphone again. Twenty twenty three fucking sucked. So we're back,
hopefully kicking ass doing some different types of cases. Let
me go off through some sources here real fast. We
have a Medium article called a Murder on Valentine's Day

(01:20:17):
written by Elizabeth Melville. We have true crime detective article
written by Michael East. We have the Stratford Herald dot
com article written by Gil Sutherland, published in October of
twenty twenty one. We have Charles Walton fifty years on
by Adrian Pengelly, published in nineteen ninety five. We have

(01:20:39):
unsolved mysteries the Folk Murder of Charles Walton, and we
also have the Metropolitan Police file.

Speaker 1 (01:20:49):
All right, I guess I'm not going to read reviews.

Speaker 2 (01:20:52):
I did notice that I got a couple new good ones,
and those are appreciated, always appreciated. It helps other people
find me, Like I always say, man, you know, even
if you don't want to join Patreon whatever else.

Speaker 1 (01:21:04):
You know, word of mouth.

Speaker 2 (01:21:05):
You know, if you listen to an episode when of
your friends might like or something.

Speaker 1 (01:21:09):
Like that, just be like, hey, check this out.

Speaker 2 (01:21:12):
I did have somebody recently, like a few months ago,
leave another bad review about you know, my language. Dude,
just fucking stop, like I literally tell you in the podcast.

Speaker 1 (01:21:23):
Description, what's going on?

Speaker 2 (01:21:25):
You know, like get your shit together, you know, fucking
mouth breathers out here anyway, ways you can reach me
justin dot mcpodcast at gmail dot com. You can search
Mysterious Circumstances on TikTok.

Speaker 1 (01:21:41):
You can find me there.

Speaker 2 (01:21:42):
You can search that same thing on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook,
literally all over the place just typing Mysterious Circumstances podcast.

Speaker 1 (01:21:53):
I am not hard to find you, guys.

Speaker 2 (01:21:56):
I suppose with all that behind us, me talking for
about an hour and a half straight, my voice is
about about shot for the night.

Speaker 1 (01:22:04):
Until next time, I will see you folks on the
flip side.